How To Make Patterned Roll Cake: Recipe & Tutorial (2024)

This super cute strawberry patterned roll cake tutorial is by Japanese baking blogger, Junko, whose deco roll cakes have taken the baking world by storm.

With the publication of her book, Deco Roll Cakes, Junko shares with us the secrets of her eye-catching cake artistry, including her fantastic selection of patterned templates. Jelly roll cakes/Swiss rolls will never be the same again!

The strawberry pattern on the deco roll cake above may look difficult to achieve but it is done just by piping some pink batter, baking it, and drawing the seeds and leaves on later — which is really easy to do!

To learn how to make more patterned roll cakes in other designs, you’ll find directions further down at the bottom of this Japanese deco roll cake recipe by Junko.

Strawberry Patterned Roll Cake Tutorial: Ingredients

(for a 25cm/10inch square baking pan)

For the roll cake:

• 4 eggs (in separate bowls: 3 egg yolks, 1 egg white, 3 egg whites)
• 35 g + 30 g caster sugar
• 60 ml water
• 40 ml vegetable oil
• ½ tsp vanilla extract
• 80 g cake flour – for the cake (Cake flour is a super light, low-protein flour popular in the US but isn’t widely available in the UK. To make your own cake flour, add three tablespoons of cornflour to a cup of plain flour, then measure out as required for this recipe).
• ½ tsp cake flour for pattern
• 1/8 tsp red liquid coloring
  (diluted with ¼ tsp water)
• a pinch + 1 tsp cornflour

For the syrup:

• 10 g caster sugar
• 20 ml hot water
• ½ Tbsp Kirsch liqueur

For the filling:

• 14 g caster sugar
• 150 ml whipping cream
• 10 strawberries

To finish:

• ½ tsp cocoa powder (dissolved in 1 tsp hot water)
• ½ tsp matcha powder (dissolved in 1 tsp hot water)

Strawberry Patterned Roll Cake Tutorial: Instructions

Before you start:

• Weigh and measure all ingredients.
• Line a baking pan with parchment paper. Dip a paper towel in vegetable oil and lightly grease parchment paper.
• Preheat oven to 170°C.
• Make a parchment cone and have a fine-tipped brush at hand also.

For the egg yolk batter

Beat 3 egg yolks in a mixing bowl. Add 35 g caster sugar, and beat with an electric mixer until mixture is light. Mix in 60 ml water, 40 ml vegetable oil and ½ tsp vanilla extract. Sift in 80 g cake flour and continue to beat until batter is sticky.

For the pattern

Take 1 tsp egg yolk batter from Step 1 and place into a bowl. Add ½ tsp cake flour and mix well.

Dilute 1/8tsp red liquid food colouring with ¼ tsp water. Add diluted colour, little by little, to bowl from Step 2 to make a pink batter.

In a clean bowl, beat 1 egg white with an electric mixer until glossy and stiff peaks are about to form. Add a pinch of cornflour and continue to beat until stiff.

Add 3 Tbsp meringue from Step 4 to batter from Step 3 and mix well. Pour into paper cone.

Cut tip of cone and pipe strawberry shapes onto parchment paper. Bake in preheated 170°C oven for 1 minute.

For the cake batter

In a clean bowl, beat 3 egg whites using an electric mixer. Once it thickens, mix in 30 g caster sugar until mixture is glossy and stiff peaks are about to form. Add 1 tsp cornflour and continue to beat until stiff.

Mix remaining meringue from Step 4 with meringue from Step 7. Add meringue mixture, one-third at a time, to remaining egg yolk batter from Step 1. Mix until smooth and no traces of meringue are left.

Pour batter onto baking pan with baked pattern (see below). Spread batter evenly with a scraper. Gently tap pan on table two to three times to remove any air pockets.

To bake

Bake in preheated 170°C oven for 14 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into cake comes out clean. Remove from oven and cover with a new sheet of parchment paper. Invert pan on a wire rack and unmould cake.

Peel off parchment paper from bottom of cake immediately and place it back on top of cake to allow latent heat to escape. Leave cake to cool.

To assemble

For the syrup: Dissolve 10 g caster sugar in 20 ml hot water. Leave to cool, then add ½ Tbsp Kirsch liqueur.

For the filling: Add 14 g caster sugar to 150 ml whipping cream in a bowl. Place bowl in an ice bath and beat with an electric mixer until stiff peaks form. Cut strawberries into quarters.

Flip cake over, so pattern faces down on parchment paper. Trim two opposite ends of cake at a diagonal. Make shallow cuts 2-cm apart on surface of cake. Brush with syrup, then spread cream filling evenly, leaving a 3-cm space at the opposite end.

Place cut strawberries on cream filling. Starting from end closest to you, roll cake outwards using parchment paper to help keep cake level. Once strawberries are inside roll, hold firmly and finish rolling tightly. Wrap cake up with parchment paper and twist both ends to secure roll.

Refrigerate for at least 1 hour.

Using fine-tipped brush, draw strawberry seeds using ½ tsp cocoa powder dissolved in 1 tsp hot water, and stalks using ½ tsp matcha powder dissolved in 1 tsp hot water. Slice both ends off deco roll with a warm knife before serving.

More Japanese Deco Roll Cake Design Ideas

To create your own unique deco roll/japanese roll cake, take any pattern you fancy and trace over it with parchment paper. Line your baking tin with this patterned paper (pencil side down, of course) and then pipe over the pattern with your colored batter and follow the remainder of the instructions above.

This strawberry patterned roll cake recipe & tutorial is reprinted with permission from Deco Roll Cakes by JUNKO, published by Marshall Cavendish.